


If You Forget Me

by thilesluna



Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter/Funhaus RPF
Genre: Emotional Constipation, Fake AH Crew, Love Confessions, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-16
Updated: 2016-12-16
Packaged: 2018-09-09 02:22:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8871943
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thilesluna/pseuds/thilesluna
Summary: Based on a poem (that's in the fic) by Pablo Neruda. Gavin is bad at feelings.





	

_I want you to know  
one thing. _

Gavin is in love with Jeremy. It’s a dangerous thing, in this life, to love someone and yet, here he is. He realizes it one day when they’re out on a job—probably the worst place to have a life changing realization, but it is what it is. He’s distracted by the way his heart skips a beat when the ground shudders from an explosion and then how his body relaxes with the sound of Jeremy’s laugh over the comms and then he knows. He’s well and truly _fucked_.

See, here’s the thing: Gavin doesn’t _do_ love. Sure, he loves his crew in the way that you love your family and he feels fiercely for them, wants them to be safe and protected, but _romantic_ love? That’s not something he _does_.

They tease him about it of course. Michael with his detective, Jack and Geoff and Ryan with their strange and perfect thing they’ve got going. Hell, even Jeremy cracks jokes about it. It’s established that Gavin does hookups and one-night stands and booty calls but _never_ relationships.

The hookups are what got him into this mess in the first place. Out for bevs with Michael and Jeremy turned into bevs with just Jeremy when Michael called it a night turned into Jeremy’s lips on his neck and Gavin’s blood singing in his veins because _shit_ , who taught Jeremy to kiss like that?

It went on for a few months, the two of them falling into each other’s beds—drunk, sober, riding the high of a successful heist. Michael doesn’t approve. He’s made it clear with the Look he gives Gavin and the way he cornered him one morning while he was sneaking back to his own room.

“Someone’s going to get hurt,” he’d said.

“Jeremy’ll be fine!” Gavin protested. “He’s a big boy and he knows what this is.”

“Maybe I wasn’t talking about Jeremy,” Michael countered, turning on his heel and walking away, leaving Gavin to stand there, confused.

He was right of course.

Damn him.

 _You know how this is:_  
_if I look_  
 _at the crystal moon, at the red branch_  
 _of the slow autumn at my window,_  
 _if I touch_  
 _near the fire_  
 _the impalpable ash_  
 _or the wrinkled body of the log,_  
 _everything carries me to you,_  
 _as if everything that exists,_  
 _aromas, light, metals,_  
 _were little boats_  
 _that sail_  
 _toward those isles of yours that wait for me_. 

Now that he knows it, now that it’s sitting heavy on his chest he can’t—he can’t stop bloody _thinking_ about it. Everything is a memory, a connection to Jeremy. Gavin wants to scream, thrash about until his throat is raw and his body tired because he can’t _escape_.

He catches violet blooms out of the corner of his eye and pictures Jeremy’s hair between his fingers, the gold rings glittering and shining in the light of the bedside table. It’s hard not to watch Jeremy in his element, dancing from place to place out in the field. The way he moves is _captivating_ , firing his gun, throwing knives, taking on rival gang members with hand-to-hand skills that Gavin can only dream of.

He finds himself chasing the scent of gunpowder and coffee—somehow Jeremy always smells of them, he remembers the scent like it’s burned into his senses—and more often than not _does_ find the man at the source, sitting at the table cleaning a gun or reading over the plans for the next heist.

It’s a dangerous game to play.

Dangerous because since the heist and since his revelation, he’s been avoiding Jeremy.

 _Well, now,_  
_if little by little you stop loving me_  
 _I shall stop loving you little by little_.   
  
_If suddenly_  
 _you forget me_  
 _do not look for me,_  
 _for I shall already have forgotten you_. 

Gavin isn’t _stupid_. He knows what he is and what he has to offer and all of is doesn’t add up to a fraction of Jeremy. Gavin is _nothing_ compared to Jeremy and so he distances himself. He spends more time in the planning room with Geoff, more time at the range with Ryan. He doesn’t take Michael up on his offer for bevs because he _knows_ Jeremy will be there too. He drinks at home in his room instead.

If anyone in the crew notices, they don’t comment.

Until, of course, they do.

“What’s the matter with you, Gav,” Michael says, over a game of Mario Party. Gavin flushes because _jesus_ , Jeremy is _right there_. He can’t have this conversation right now.

“Whatcha mean, boi?” he asks, goes for nonchalant but he can’t even fool himself.

“You’re acting— _weird_ ,” Michael replies. “Always in your room, never out for bevs.” He squints at the TV, mashing the button to roll. As Yoshi moves through the map, he fixes Gavin with a stare.

“I’m—that’s not—“

“It’s true!” Jeremy calls. “This is the first extended period of time you’ve spent with me and Michael in like two weeks! _And_ we basically had to force you to stay.”

Michael raises an eyebrow. “Avoiding us?”

“No!” Gavin says quickly. “I’m not _avoiding_ you. I’m—“

“Sure seems like you are,” Jeremy mutters. He sounds disappointed, sad. Gavin can’t help but feel this isn’t just teasing with him like it is for Michael. He’s bunged it all up already. _This_ is why. He’s going to _ruin_ everything he’s worked for because he fell in bloody _love_.

He’s going to ruin _Jeremy_.

“I have to go,” he says suddenly, dropping the Wii-mote onto the couch and nearly sprinting from the room. He doesn’t stop when he hears Michael call his name, doesn’t look back when Jeremy does too.

 _If you think it long and mad,_  
_the wind of banners_  
 _that passes through my life,_  
 _and you decide_  
 _to leave me at the shore_  
 _of the heart where I have roots,_  
 _remember_  
 _that on that day,_  
 _at that hour,_  
 _I shall lift my arms_  
 _and my roots will set off_  
 _to seek another land_. 

“What the _fuck_ , Gavin?”

He flinches back from the voice, from the bright light that’s suddenly flooding his room. The blanket slips over his face like a shield and he curls in on himself. He’s not facing anything today. He won’t.

Someone tugs at the blanket, rips it from his body and tosses it aside. He pretends he doesn’t notice the sharp intake of breath. “What the fuck _happened_?”

Gavin thinks he might still be a little drunk from the night before. It’s hard to tell the difference between next day drunk and concussion sometimes. He wipes at his face with bruised knuckles and split skin. They come away covered in dried and crusting blood. “What does it matter,” he slurs out. “s’Not important anyway.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” And of _course_ it’s Jeremy. “You look like you got the shit kicked out of you and you fuckin’ _reek_ like booze man.” He reaches out to touch Gavin’s shoulder and Gavin jerks away.

“Don’t—“

Jeremy huffs out a hollow laugh. “What, I’m not good enough to touch you any more?”

The anger and the hurt in his voice hit Gavin like a physical blow. Jeremy’s wrong. So, _so_ wrong. It isn’t that he’s not good enough. Lies fall off of Gavin’s lips like water, he’s not _good_. He’s black dye. He’s one drop away from ruining the brilliance of Jeremy’s colors. He should be honest. He should just _tell him_.

Instead, he finally cracks open his eyes, _sneers_ at Jeremy and says, “That’s right.”

Gavin wishes he didn’t open his damn eyes.

Jeremy’s face _crumbles_. He stands there, gaping at Gavin like he can’t comprehend what he’s hearing. “Fuck _you_ ,” Jeremy says. “Fuck you, Gavin.”

The door slamming feels infinitely final and Gavin feels it reverberate through his very bones. He should feel better, should be able to reconcile the fact that he just saved Jeremy but all he feels is empty.

 _But_  
_if each day,_  
 _each hour,_  
 _you feel that you are destined for me_  
 _with implacable sweetness,_  
 _if each day a flower_  
 _climbs up to your lips to seek me_ , 

  
As with most things in their lives, it starts with an explosion.

The explosion knocks him off his feet and when he comes to, it’s dark. Too dark. Gavin’s proud of how he only freaks out for a moment before he finds his phone in his pocket and clicks on the flashlight. The building they were in has caved in. He can’t see more than a few feet in front of him but he pushes himself to his knees to crawl through the rubble. Bruised ribs, possible broken nose, too many cuts and scrapes to count but he’s _alive_.

His pants catch on a piece of rebar and rip. Gavin curses loudly and is checking the damage when he hears a quiet voice in the dark. “Gav?”

He’s on his feet in a heat beat, grimacing at the twinge in his knee. “Jeremy?”

“Oh thank god,” Jeremy laughs, relief tinged with slight hysteria. “I’m stuck.” There’s the shifting of rubble and Gavin can _just_ hear the pained sound Jeremy makes.

“Oi, idiot! Stop tryin’ to move until I find you!” he hisses. The beam of light from his phone catches a flash of purple in the darkness and he nearly cries. It’s treacherous, picking his way over the hunks of concrete and debris, but he falls to his knees at Jeremy’s side moments later. “Jesus, Lil J.”

There’s the remains of a wall pinning one of Jeremy’s legs and Gavin nearly feels ill at what that could mean. Jeremy must catch his hesitation, or maybe can see the way his face changes in the dim light of the phone. “I don’t think it’s too bad,” he says quietly. “I can still feel it, which is a good sign.”

“We gotta get you out of here,” Gavin says, running a hand through his hair. His fingers come away sticky with blood but he wipes them quickly on his pants so Jeremy won’t see. “I think I can lift it enough. Just so you can slide out.”

Jeremy grits his teeth. “Just don’t—don’t fuckin’ drop it on me, okay?”

“Wouldn’t dream of it, J.” Gavin assesses the slab and where it’s covering Jeremy’s leg. He really should be able to move it, though he wishes Michael were here at the moment to help. When he settles in, two hands beneath the top of it, he glances back at Jeremy. “Ready?”

“As I’ll ever be,” Jeremy replies, bracing his elbows at ninety-degrees, ready to slide his lower body free from the mess. Gavin plants his feet and counts back from three. At _one_ he lifts with every once of strength in his body and, miraculously, the hunk of building shifts. He hears Jeremy scuttle back even as his arms start to shake.

“Jeremy—J are you good? I can’t—“

“I’m out, Gavin, you can let it go.” The slab goes crashing back down and Gavin collapses, head spinning. “Gav? GAVIN!”

He tilts his head and he can see Jeremy’s face surrounded by a purple halo. “Hey hey, Lil J,” he slurs. His head is pounding and his ribs ache.

“What the hell, Gavin!” There are hands on the back of his head and then Jeremy is cursing under his breath.

“s’Fine, Jeremy.” Gavin can feel the wet drip of the head wound down his neck. Must have exacerbated it with all the straining, One hand puts pressure, a sharp sting while the other pets gently through the rest of his hair. “’m a liar,” he says abruptly. “You know that right?”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Jeremy’s panicking a little bit. Gavin doesn’t blame him even as he’s losing consciousness _fast_ because he wouldn’t want the hassle of a passed out teammate while alone in a half-collapsed building. It’s a lot to handle.

“I _lie_ ,” Gavin says. “I lie all the time. For my job, for the crew, to keep us safe, or sometimes to get what I want.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because I lied to you,” he mutters, shutting his eyes. “I promised myself I’d never do it unless was necessary to keep you safe but I kind of twisted that in on itself and I lied to you.”

Jeremy levers him closer, practically across his lap. “Keep me safe from what?”

“From me.”

“Gavin—“

“It was kind of a cop out, I know, but at the time—at the time I really believed it.” Gavin pries his eyes back open. It’s important that he’s looking at Jeremy for this. “I lied to you when you asked me if you were good enough to touch me.” Jeremy’s face flushes and Gavin wants to reach out and trace the lines from his forehead. “It’s the other way ‘round, Jeremy. I was afraid I’d turn you dark, muddle you all up and ruin you. So I lied and do you want to know the real truth?”

Jeremy nods slowly. “Yeah, Gav. I do.”

Gavin sighs and closes his eyes again. He breathes in deep, finding the scent of gunpowder and coffee even through the cloudy air of the collapsed building. “I’ve never really loved anyone before but I sure as _hell_ love you. And I know this is a shit time to say it and it seems like I’m only doing it because we’re trapped here, but I do. I love you despite all the times I tried to lie to _myself_ that I don’t.” Jeremy’s fingers tighten on his upper arms. “I feel like I’m burning up when I’m with you but it’s unbearable without you,” he goes on. “I don’t want to go without you any more.”

The silence settles over them the same way the dust has begun to settle. Gavin’s eyes are still closed and he thinks wildly for a moment that maybe this isn’t real at all, that he’ll wake in his own bed in a moment, that this will fall into the realm of fantasy and nothing more.

It’s the kiss that breaks him of this.

Jeremy’s lips are dry, dirty from the explosion, and chilled from the cool night air but they’re still the best sensation Gavin has ever felt in his life.

 _ah my love, ah my own,_  
_in me all that fire is repeated,_  
 _in me nothing is extinguished or forgotten,_  
 _my love feeds on your love, beloved,_  
 _and as long as you live it will be in your arms_  
 _without leaving mine_. 


End file.
